Massacre Trail

By Willard Davis

The question is this, what do we accept as the truth of what we believe in? We take many things by mere faith, but is faith the right path in putting our trust in a matter just because someone says so? Do we dig into a matter with an open mind rather than prejudice and influences from others as we were growing up? Does our relationship with others influence our perception of what is truth and what is not the truth? Do we tend to accept something as truth because we don’t have time or resources to check it out? Or is it because of an emphatic speech by a cleric that proclaims the Bible is “without error” when in fact outside sources point to errors in dates, events, and even interpretation, yet we close our eyes and ears because we ask, “How can this be?” Many times the excuse is made that if so many people believe in a particular biblical statement or condition, then it can’t be wrong! Or can it? Debate on biblical issues end up boggling the general populous, and many just walk away from it with disgust, won’t deal with it, or dogmatically hold a position of biblical inerrancy. This brings us down to getting into the trenches of discovering the truth, as ugly and contentious it may seem. This is especially true when ufology is brought into the picture, especially when the topic of God or a God is introduced and examined in the light of various scientific disciplines.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: May 4, 2015
• ISBN: 9781634178365

Book preview

Dedication 

I would like to dedicate this book to my wife, Ruth; my sister, Mary; my brother, James, my brother, Jerry; and a very special dedication to my late brother, Wayne—who died before I published this book, and his son, Ben, who always thought his dad was a hero. 

Chapter 1 

Finally, after over five years, we were closing in on the most ruthless gang of murderers and thieves that ever roamed the Oklahoma territory. In the past two years, I had followed their trail until I was getting weary of it. But I couldn’t give it up. Somebody had to stop the cold-blooded killers. They had no human morals in their black hearts. In the past two years, my brothers and a tracker by the name of George Gonzales had joined me in the search for these blackhearted bastards. My name is Willard Davis. My brothers’ names are James, Jerry, and Wayne. In the past two years since we have been searching for them, they have given us the name, the Davis brothers. James is the oldest. I’m the next oldest. Then there’s Jerry, and the last but not the least is Wayne. 

We have one sister, but she is not in this story. James is the thinker of our family. I’m just the man with the fast gun. Jerry is kind of a pacifist, he will walk away from an argument most of the time. Wayne is the quiet giant of our family. He stands six feet seven tall in his bare feet and weighs over 280 pounds all muscle. When it’s called heavy lifting or fighting, we give it to Wayne. He has a very gentle nature, but when he’s riled, he can be a real bad man to mess with. He has been known to fight a grizzly bear with just the deadly knife he wears in a sheath on a belt around his waist. We were born in southern Mississippi to a sharecropper couple. We barely eked out a living raising cotton in burnt out soil that had too much cotton planted in it. The cross where scraggly at best. If my dad hadn’t raised hogs and cattle and had planted a garden each year, we would have went very hungry. We also supplemented our food supply by hunting and fishing. My dad taught us to shoot with a rifle and a pistol. We could shoot a squirrel out of a tree at fifty feet with a rifle. When I strapped the first pistol, it felt like it was a part of me. I was left-handed, so I wore my holster on my left side. 

Whenever I finished all my chores, I was always practicing my fast draw. If it hadn’t been for my mother teaching us the importance of education, we would have grown up as a bunch of ignorant hicks. Every night, she made us read and write and do math problems. James decided he wanted more education. When he turned sixteen, he left the farm and went back east to continue his education. He would write us a few lines every once in a while. When I left home, I wanted to travel. I finally joined an outfit driving a herd of steers from Kansas to New Mexico. The ramrod taught me how to throw a rope and to cut out steers. I worked hard and listened and learned. I was beginning to be a damned good driver. By the time we got the herd to New Mexico, I had become a full-fledged cowboy. After we sold the herd and I was paid off, I drifted down to Texas. I got me a job ramrodding a herd back to New Mexico. Since I was good with a pistol, I got me a deputy’s job with the sheriff in Albuquerque. I never spent my money foolishly. I only spent my money for living expenses. When I wasn’t working, I was always practicing drawing and shooting. 

I didn’t know it at the time, but people were calling me a gun hawk. I stayed on with the sheriff as his deputy for two years. One day, I walked into the sheriff’s office on a Monday morning and told him I was quitting. He said, Bill, you’re the best man I have ever had as a deputy. Yeah, the most levelheaded man for a gunman I have ever seen. I said, Charlie, I’m not a gunman. He said, To hell you’re not. I’ve seen you break up a saloon fight by walking into the saloon and shouting. That’s enough. They looked at you and stopped fighting. They know that you could draw that hogleg and put a bullet in them in a second if you wanted to. I have seen you shoot a man in gunfight and never kill him. You’re so fast with the gun that it’s frightening. Individual years I’ve known you, you’re the most levelheaded man with a gun I have ever seen. You know when it’s time to use it and when it’s not time. I also know that you have never lost a fistfight since I know you. You could run for the sheriff’s job and get elected hands down. I said, Charlie, thanks for the compliment. 

Chapter 2 

When Jerry left the farm, he settled in Albuquerque. He started a stage line with a used stagecoach and a team of mules. Wayne had gone to the mountains to trap and hunt for a living. He had always been partial to the mountains, so he became a mountain man. I left the deputy’s job and roamed around the country. When I wasn’t herding cattle for a living, I was being a lawman in some untamed town. I guess you might call me fiddle-footed. I just wanted to be free and not tied down. As the years passed, I kept roaming the western states working at different jobs and saving my extra money. As the years passed, there was a talk about a civil war. It seemed that some people were opposed to slavery. Most of the people in the North were against it. But most of the people in the South were for it. When it stopped being tall, and I knew we were going to war, I got in contact with my brother, James. I told him that we all needed to meet somewhere and talk about the impending war. I said, If you can get in contact with Jerry and Wayne, we could meet in Kansas City, Missouri. We finally got together a few weeks before the war. I said, Y’all know my feelings is for the Southern states. James said, That’s because you have always been a rebel. 

James, Jerry, and Wayne joined the Union. Because James was college educated, he went as a major. They made Jerry a lieutenant and Wayne a master sergeant because of his size and knowledge of firearms. I joined as a sniper in the Confederate army. 

I was certainly glad we never met on the battlefield. For years after the war, there was lawlessness everywhere. The only law was gun law. With the carpetbaggers taking southern and western land, there were people getting killed everywhere. It was utter chaos. It was shoot or be shot. There was robbing and killing everywhere in the south and west. The Union army was spread too thin to maintain martial law. Most people just wanted to rebuild their lives and then left alone. These soldiers returning from the war saw that their homes had been burned or stolen by carpetbaggers and sold for what profit it would gain them. This caused bitter resentment between the rebels and the Yankees. It made for a lot of bloodshed on both sides. Then there was the marauding gangs that killed rebels and Yankees both. They didn’t care who they killed. They just wanted to steal what money or possessions they had. The soldiers that have seen enough carnage on the battlefield to last them a lifetime just wanted to live in peace and left alone. 

Some of the worst soldiers on both sides turned to robbery and murder. They had rather kill and steal instead of doing an honest day’s work. Then you had your deserters and renegades. One such gang not only killed their victims, but also tortured and raped the women, young girls, and children before killing them. They made sure all of their victims were dead so that their identity was kept secret. Then they would burn every building on the ranch or farm. I had decided it was time to drift again. I quit the job I had and started roaming the countryside. I wasn’t heading in any particular direction when I came up on one of their massacres. The brutality and carnage they left behind made me vomit. I had witnessed brutality before, but I wasn’t prepared for anything as evil as what I was seeing. The scene before me was the most horrendous inhuman treatment to another human that I had ever seen. After I had buried what was left of their bodies, I swore to God that I wouldn’t rest until I either captured or killed every last one of the murdering sons of bitches that had done this grisly deed. I swore I was going to catch them even if it took me the rest of my life. Their trail was easy to follow until the rains came, and washed it away. It seemed like their trails would just vanish whenever I got close to them. I was making it my life’s work trying to catch these bastards. 

Chapter 3 

It was going on five years that I had been after these bastards. I was never able to get close enough to even see them. I had no idea what they even looked like. Even the possess that went after them were never fortunate enough to catch them. The gang and one lone gunman made headlines in newspapers all over the states. That was how my brothers found out what I was doing and decided they needed to join me in my search. They met up with each other and went to a town where a reporter had gotten a broken nose and jaw. He kept trying to get an interview with the gunman that was after the gang. He wouldn’t take no for an answer, so I broke his nose and jaw. My brothers didn’t find me there in that town because the sheriff told me I had to leave. He said I can’t walk around breaking reporters’ noses and jaws and that he didn’t want the town to get a bad name. I had been gone over a week when my brothers showed up there. They stopped in a saloon and asked the bartender about a left-handed gunman. His name is Bill Davis. The bartender puffed up and said, That bastard wasn’t so tough we ran his ass out of town. What are y’all after them for? Wayne said, We’re not after him. He’s our brother. Did you personally help run my brother out of town? The bartender stammered and said, No, sir. I was just running my big mouth, trying to act tough. Wayne said, That’s good because my brother could have mopped up the floor with five of the likes of you. Now what really happened? The bartender answered, The sheriff asked him real nice like to leave town after he hit the reporter. Wayne said, I’m the real gentle type most of the time, but if I ever hear of you saying anything but kind words about my brother again, I will come back and break you in half. He reached down with one hand and picked up the bartender and tossed him all the way across the saloon with his one arm. He walked over to where the bartender landed and squatted down. He said, What do you think I could do to you if I was mad? The bartender was looking at Wayne with fear in his eyes. He wisely didn’t say another word. Wayne suddenly wrinkled up his nose and stood up real quick and said, Mister, you need to go get a bath and change your shitty clothes." 

The customers that were in the saloon had been enjoying the conversation between Wayne and the bartender. They busted out laughing at the point Wayne told the bartender about needing a bath. One of the customers hollered, Harry, you and that bottom dealing tinhorn gambler might just as well pack up and leave town today. We won’t ever let you forget what you did today. I’m going to make sure that the old town knows that you shit all over yourself. My brothers were on their way out of the saloon when the sheriff stormed. He looked at Harry lying on the floor, then took stock of Wayne’s size. Timidly he asked, Wayne, did you do that to Harry? Wayne said, Yes, I did, Sheriff. Harry told me that he was constipated. I told him I knew a new remedy that would make him go quick. He asked me to give it to him. I didn’t know it would work that quick, or I wouldn’t have given it to him. He tried to run and get to the toilet in time, but he fell down and shit himself. The sheriff asked, Is that what happened, Harry? He just shook his head yes and didn’t say a word. The customers in the saloon told the sheriff that’s what happened. They all broke out laughing. 

Sheriff, James asked, did Bill Davis say where he might be heading when you told him to leave town? The sheriff suddenly turned mean and said, I ain’t married to your damned business. Wayne said, Here we go again. He reached down and hauled the sheriff up off the floor